by Eric Lane
CHARACTERS
TANTE MABEL PRIDEAUX: (Mid- to late fifties.) Former resident of a lovely suburban street in New Orleans.
LUCILLE PRIDEAUX VERNON: (Thirties) Mabel’s daughter and resident of Manhattan.
TIFFANY FIELDS: (Thirties) Mabel’s niece and resident of Manhattan.
SETTING
The site of what was Tante Mabel’s home in New Orleans, two years after Katrina hit. All three women wear rubber gloves and work clothes. There are three large trash bags filled with items. Everyone swats at mosquitoes.
This play is dedicated to those who survived and to those who perished in hurricane Katrina
At rise, LUCILLE is alone, digging onstage, discarding items here and there. She wipes the sweat from her neck and face, and looks up with hostility at the brutal sun. After a beat, TIFFANY enters from offstage left, carrying three bottles of water and looking somewhat cooler. LUCILLE glances at her watch.
LUCILLE: If it ain’t Miss Tiff.
TIFFANY: Sorry. Fell asleep in the car and got a crick in my neck. Here.
(TIFFANY extends the water bottle to LUCILLE, who takes it and drinks gratefully.)
Where is she?
LUCILLE: Behind the garage.
TIFFANY: Isn’t that dangerous?
LUCILLE: She had to pee.
TIFFANY: I’m holding mine till we get back to the hotel. I left the air con on and the motor running. (Calling offstage.) Tante Mabel? (She swats at mosquitoes.) I’m a damn hors d’oeuvres platter. (Pointing to her bites.) Look at this. Here, here, and here. One even got down in my bra! I’ll be glad to get gone. She finished with all this?
LUCILLE: I sure am. Let’s wrap the crap and put a bow on it.
TIFFANY: This is tough on her, Cille. Be gentle.
(She sees MABEL approaching.)
Shhhhh.
(MABEL enters carrying a rock.)
LUCILLE: What’s that for?
MABEL: I need a favor.
TIFFANY: Whatever you want as long as it’s back at the hotel. What do you ladies say to a cool shower, a cold beer and a hot filé gumbo?
MABEL: When we’re through here.
LUCILLE: And that would be now. There’s nothing else left, Mama.
(LUCILLE picks up a rusty object and tosses it away.)
MABEL: Put that in the bag.
LUCILLE: (Picking it up.) But it’s nothing but rust.
MABEL: Well, it’s my rust. Put it in the bag.
TIFFANY: What is it?
MABEL: I made Papa Prideaux his first cup of coffee as a married man in that pot.
TIFFANY: Oh, it’s a coffeepot.
MABEL: Fresh brewed with a lot of chicory. Just how he liked it. That first morning, that first day of our lives together.
(MABEL marks out the areas she refers to.)
The stove was here. The sky turned pink out my window right over here. Got the coffee beans from the bin down here. Cups from the hooks under the shelves that were here. Walked out on the porch over here. Put the coffee down on the little table he had made right here. Sat in the two chairs on either side, sipping and laughing and waving at the Pearsons on their porch over there. Ella Pearson just sliding her greedy eyes up and down Papa’s skin too. I saw her. But he was mine. Just sipping and loving that coffee out of my brand-new pot. Smiling and crinkling the corners of his eyes. Tilting back his chair and me scolding him and him laughing and scooping me in his arms. And us leaving our coffee cups and climbing our stairs over here. Never did make it to church that Sunday. If it weren’t for that coffeepot you’re turning your nose up at, you might not even be standing here, Miss Lucille.
TIFFANY: That’s so romantic.
LUCILLE: I truly appreciate it, Mama. And if that’s what it is, we’ll find a special place for it. (She puts the rusty pot in the bag.) Well, Tiff’s got the air con running, so …
(LUCILLE and TIFFANY start dragging loaded trash bags toward the car offstage. TIFFANY stops, turns around, and looks at the site of the house.)
TIFFANY: Good-bye, 211 Derbigny and the summer of 1986. And to Tante Mabel’s beignets, and June Bug Pearson’s kissing me behind the garage.
LUCILLE: Good-bye, 211 Derbigny and Papa Prideaux’s switch off that bush over there, and watermelon off Mr. Granville’s truck, and nights of stars and crickets and Mama humming over that bowl of snap beans. And when George Bush, Michael Brown and the entire FEMA administration go to hell, and that’s exactly where they’re going—may it look just like this. Amen. (Pause. Softly.) Mama, put the rock down and say good-bye now.
MABEL: I need something from the glove box.
LUCILLE: What glove box.
MABEL: (Gesturing offstage right.) In Papa’s Buick Skylark.
LUCILLE: Yeah, well the only problem about getting into the Skylark is that there’s a garage on top of it. (Lightly.) I know we’re strong black women and all, but the car’s crushed.
MABEL: Only on one side.
(MABEL makes a move toward the car offstage right. LUCILLE blocks her path.)
LUCILLE: I don’t want a scene about this, Mama.
MABEL: (Brandishing her rock.) You just have to break the window on the driver’s side.
TIFFANY: Now Tante Mabel, Cille and I juggled a lot of things in our lives to do this for you. But now, hard as it is, it’s time to say good-bye. That’s what this has always been about—letting go of this part of your life. We know it’s painful and we’re here for you.
MABEL: And I appreciate everything you girls have done. (Indicating the trash bags.) But the most important thing is what’s in the glove box.
LUCILLE: Wish you’d told me that two days and three trash bags ago.
TIFFANY: You see that the garage is perched up on the Skylark, Tante Mabel. So we have to let go of whatever is in there. Maybe we should all just go on and have a great big old cry.
MABEL: Papa came to me in my dream last night. Said I have to get it.
LUCILLE: Here we go …
MABEL: Say I need to go in the glove box and take what’s in the bag. Say if I hold it to the sky and turn three times, then put it to my heart, it’ll heal the ground.
(LUCILLE starts dragging the trash bag toward the car stage left.)
LUCILLE: Motor’s running, time’s a-wasting and you know I ain’t down with the hoodoo.
(TANTE MABEL lies down on the ground.)
TIFFANY: Oh no.
LUCILLE: Now, Mama, you get up from there. (Pause.) You want everyone to see you acting crazy like this? You want the neighbors saying Mabel Prideaux came down from New York and lost her natural mind?
MABEL: All my neighbors gone. Gone for a thousand miles.
LUCILLE: Come on, now, people. We gotta go.
TIFFANY: (Crossing her legs and bouncing.) Seriously.
MAMA: I’ll go when I get it.
(LUCILLE takes TIFFANY aside.)
LUCILLE: Any more great ideas? I told you to let her remember it the way it was and mourn. Seeing this has been too much of a shock. She tossed and turned all last night.
TIFFANY: She’s been going downhill, Lucille. She needed these objects for closure.
LUCILLE: (Sarcastically.) Of course, Dr. Phil. I’m sorry I mistook you for my cousin Tiffany the hospital cafeteria worker. (Pause.) I appreciate your help, Tiff, don’t get me wrong. You’ve been more like another daughter than her niece, and Lord knows I think of you as a sister. But the ultimate decision is mine.
MABEL: I don’t know what you’re whispering but it ain’t gonna matter.
LUCILLE: She’s going on the antidepressants.
TIFFANY: Medication is not the cure-all.
LUCILLE: She’s got her rusty coffeepot. Time to do it my way. Let’s wrap the crap and put a bow on it.
TIFFANY: Be gentle, Lucille.
LUCILLE: You know how I get when I’m hot, tired and evil, Mama. Don’t make me leave you out here.
MABEL: Leave me here to die and bury me with Papa.
TIFFANY: We’re not lea
ving you, Tante Mabel. Listen, is there money in the glove box? I know, how Papa Prideaux used to squirrel money away everywhere. Is it money? ’Cause if it is, it’s gonna be molded and rotting in that glove box by now.
MABEL: What I want with money? (TIFFANY talks as she exits offstage right toward the Skylark.)
TIFFANY: What did Papa Prideaux say in the dream?
LUCILLE: Where the hell are you going?
MABEL: (Sitting up on her elbow.) It’s in a small black drawstring bag.
LUCILLE: (LUCILLE yells to TIFFANY offstage.) That’s police tape, Tiffany! What part of “DO NOT ENTER” is unclear?
(MABEL tries to go to TIFFANY offstage. LUCILLE blocks her path.)
Would you stay here, please, Mama? Do you know how dangerous this is?
TIFFANY: (Offstage.) The whole passenger side is crushed.
LUCILLE: (To TIFFANY.) A garage will do that to a car. What do you think it’s gonna do to you?
TIFFANY: (Offstage.) The driver’s door is okay structurally but it won’t open.
MABEL: (To TIFFANY.) Take my rock and break the window.
LUCILLE: (To TIFFANY.) No! If the car shifts it’ll bring the garage right down …
(Sound of glass breaking.)
MABEL: (To TIFFANY.) All right!!! Now go in through the window and slide across the seat!
LUCILLE: Tiffany, don’t you even think about! … Don’t you! … You did NOT just climb in that window!
MABEL: Praise Jesus, she’s in!
(LUCILLE gets out her cell phone and dials 911.)
LUCILLE: I’m holding you responsible if anything happens …
MABEL: (To TIFFANY.) It’s in the back left-hand corner of the glove box.
(LUCILLE and MABEL talk simultaneously.)
LUCILLE: (Into her cell phone.) Yes, good afternoon, Officer. This is Lucille Prideaux Vernon and I’m calling from 211 Derbigny in the Ninth Ward. I’m here from New York to help my mother recover some items and my cousin Tiffany has just gone through the window of my father’s Buick Skylark which is under a garage …
MABEL: (Praying.) Lord Jesus, Prideaux, don’t let anything happen to this child. She and Lucille are all I’ve got in the world. She’s in your service, Prideaux. Protect her, guide her. (She begins to sing a spiritual loudly.)
LUCILLE: Mama, please!
(Suddenly MABEL jumps up and claps her hands.)
MABEL: That’s it!
(LUCILLE is dumbstruck for a second, then speaks into her phone.)
LUCILLE: I’m sorry, Officer. The situation seems to have … I think she’s all right …
(TIFFANY enters. Her clothes are dirty and she has minor abrasions. She proudly holds a black drawstring bag and gives it to MABEL.)
MABEL: Thank you, baby! This is just how it looked in my dream!
LUCILLE: I’m sorry, sir. We won’t need you after all.
(She disconnects and speaks to TIFFANY.)
TIFFANY: Well that was a taste of hell. I am seriously out of shape.
LUCILLE: Are you out of your mind?
TIFFANY: No sense coming all the way down here for closure and not getting it.
LUCILLE: We need to put some disinfectant on those cuts.
TIFFANY: Can we find a bathroom first?
(They turn to grab a trash bag but are stopped in their tracks by the sight of TANTE MABEL holding something aloft in her palm and walking in a large circle and humming.)
What’s she doing?
LUCILLE: Who knows. You know I hate that hoodoo crap. What was in the damn bag anyway?
TIFFANY: I was scared to look. Felt like a marble or something.
(LUCILLE and TIFFANY approach MABEL gingerly.)
LUCILLE: Time to go, Mama.
MABEL: Give me a minute.
TIFFANY: What are you doing, Tante Mabel?
MABEL: Letting him see.
TIFFANY: God?
MABEL: Papa Prideaux.
(LUCILLE blocks MABEL’s path and takes her gently by the shoulders.)
LUCILLE: I don’t do crazy, Mama, and neither do you. Lord knows there’s enough grief to drive us insane. But we’ve always gotten out of the car one stop before Nutville. I won’t let you go there now.
MABEL: I’m not crazy, daughter. This’ll make sure.
(MABEL smiles at LUCILLE and puts something in LUCILLE’s palm. LUCILLE looks at it, screams, drops it, and jumps back several paces.)
LUCILLE: Oh, my God!
TIFFANY: What is it? What is it?
LUCILLE: (Pointing.) Look there! I’m not touching it!
(TIFFANY walks over to examine the object.)
TIFFANY: Is that an eye?
MABEL: Yes, sugar.
TIFFANY: (Picking it up.) It’s glass.
LUCILLE: Keep it away from me.
TIFFANY: What was this doing in the glove box?
MABEL: It was Papa Prideaux’s.
TIFFANY: Papa Prideaux had a glass eye?
LUCILLE: What?!
MABEL: (Laughing.) He was way too handsome and too proud to let folks know. He learned how to turn his head so the eyes always looked in the same direction.
LUCILLE: No way. My papa did NOT have a glass eye.
MABEL: A piece of shrapnel in Vietnam did it. He was one of the lucky ones. He came home. I was the only one who knew. Each night before he went to sleep he put it in that jelly jar by his bed. Told me if anything ever happened, that would be the piece of him left to look out for me. When he died at the Dome, wasn’t no more I could do for him. But I damn sure wasn’t gonna take out his eye in front of all those strangers and embarrass him. I buried him in that eye. But Papa came to me last night in a dream to say he had a spare in the glove box.
(Pause. TIFFANY and LUCILLE look at each other, dumbfounded.)
TIFFANY: Wow!
LUCILLE: Yeah, okay. Whatever. This is the icing on the gravy. Can we go now?
MABEL: Hush a moment, daughter.
(She holds the eye aloft in her palm, looks upward, and calls.)
Papa Prideaux! All you saints and angels! Mother Goddess, Father God and all the African diasporic deities—see us here. Bless this ground and the people buried in it. Bless the bodies in the bayou and the limbs under levees. Bless the blood and bones that shadow us. Protect your sorrowful children. Bring us hope in the days of our hereafter. Bring us peace in the rhythms of our heart. Look kindly on these your three daughters—you host of beatific spirits. Consecrate this ground with your love. Weave your promises through the fabric of our pain. Nourish our hollowness with your songs. May the wind carry your kisses to our hungry lips. May the sun beam your knowledge into our shivering souls. May you look kindly on this ground of remembrance and imprint the soil with a token of our having been here at all. Give us your kindly regard. Keep us in your wise and loving vision. Now and forevermore. Amen. And, Prideaux … I’m gonna shine up that coffeepot and put your eye in it. You come back to my dreams, you hear. I won’t be so scared of you now. Merci, mon cher mari. Mon amour toujours.
(Silence. LUCILLE and TIFFANY are still, almost hypnotized. MABEL breaks the spell by putting the eye into her brassiere, grabbing a trash bag, and dragging it stage left toward the car.)
Let’s go, girls. That motor’s running and Tiffany’s about to wet her pants.
LUCILLE: But, Mama … how did you … where did he …?
TIFFANY: Let’s go, Lucille. Nothing more to be said. Tante Mabel done wrapped up the crap and put a bow on it!
(All three exit, pulling their trash bags.)
END OF PLAY
A VERY VERY SHORT PLAY
Jacquelyn Reingold
A Very Very Short Play was first produced by Ensemble Studio Theatre, William Carden, artistic director, June 2008, in their One-act Marathon. It was directed by Jonathan Bernstein. Producer, James Carter; set design, Maiko Chii; costume design, Molly Rebuschatis; lighting design, Evan Purcell; sound design, Shane Rettig. The actors were:
JOAN Julie Fitzpatrick
; ROGER Adam Dannheisser
CHARACTERS
ROGER: Thirties.
JOAN: Thirties.
PLACE
On an airplane.
TIME
Now.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Joan and Roger should be played by actors of average height. In the Ensemble Studio Theatre production the underlined stage directions were prerecorded, then played, as if spoken by the pilot.